Apparatus for cleaning bottles



June 4, 1935. P. s. PlTTE-NGER APPARATUS FOR CLEANING BOTTLES Filed March 16, 1931 2 Sheets-Sheet 1 INVENTOR ATTORNEYS 72/5 BY 7Z1 June 4, 1935. P. s. PITTENGER APPARATUS FOR CLEANING BOTTLES 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 Filed March 16, 1951 7 Trit; :[1

O O O I mmfl-l ATTORNEY Patented June 4, 1935 g a UNITED STATES PATENT OFF-ICE APPARATUS FOR CLEANIN BOTTLES Paul S. Pittenger, Philadelphia, Pa., assignor to Sharp & Dohme, Incorporated, Philadelphia, Pa., a corporation of Maryland Application March 16, 1931, Serial No. 522,927

'LGlaims. (01. 15-20) This invention relates to cleaning bottles by a better appearance due to the fact that their blowing them just prior to filling them and inoriginal gloss is not removed by my method of cludes both method and apparatus. More parcleaning. ticularly the invention relates to apparatus for The preferred embodiment of the invention blowing bottles one at a time by means of an air shown in the accompanying drawings is adapted 5 jet from a tube inserted successively into the for treating cylindrical bottles. With slight mouth of each bottle and then ejecting the botmodification the apparatus shown may be adapttle from the blowing machine. ed for handling and blowing bottles of other It is customary to subject bottles used for pharshapes. According to this preferred method, the

- maceutical preparations, foods, etc. to a cleanbottles are fed by gravity from an .inclined shelf 10 ing operation immediately prior to filling them. into a horizontal trough referred to herein as the In general this cleaning is some sort of wet wash bottle holder. While in the trough an air nozzle treatment. Such cleaning treatments require is inserted through the mouth of the bottle and careful supervision to make certain that the the bottle is blown with air with suflicient force water used in the final rinse is clean water, and, to remove all solid particles from the interior of 15 furthermore, to see that all foreign particles are the bottle. The nozzle is generally merely the removed from the bottles and that the bottles open end of an air tube. The bottle is then are thoroughly dried before being filled. Such ejected from the trough and the air nozzle is methods of cleaning are time-consuming and the withdrawn so that the trough is empty nd ready labor charges are considerable. to receive the next bottle to be treaed. The 20 I have found that it is not necessary to wash bottles are ejected on to an inclined conveyor the bottles before fi lin t if y are p p y which delivers them upright onto still another handled from the time of their manufacture up to conveyor which delivers them to the filling mathe time that they are being filled. The botchine or other treating apparatus.

tles are not only clean but sterile when they leave The insertion of the air tube into the bottle and 25 the leer where they are annealed. I package the action of the ejector are so synchronized that them on leaving the leer in cartons or other conthe whole operation takes the minimum of time. tainers in which they remain untihjust prior to The insertion of the air tube and the forward and filling them. Preferably the bottles are placed backward movement of the ejector'are controlled in the cartons in an inverted position. They by the operation of cams and the various opera- 30 y be pp although, if inverted, the tions are so co-ordinated that after the ejection mouth of the bott e is pressed against the bottom of one bottle the ejector returns to the position of the container with sufficient pressure to satisin which t is adapted t ei th me factorily seal the bottle. Each carton or other and th air jet is withdrawn so t t t t 5 container holds a dozen bottles, more or less, and bottle to be t t falls t place t t neck the bottles are brought in the carton or other in t ejector-head, ready to be blown. The'air contain! directly to a 9 feeds tube is then inserted through the neck of the them the. b w apparatus y mventmn bottle and the bottle is blown and the ejector is "from which they may be fed alliomaiwally to then moved forward to remove the bottle from 40 fill-mg machine- From the fillmg machine they the bottle holder before the airtube is withdrawn. 40 are delivered to another containerfor final pack-- The ejector and air tube then move. backward to aging 3 may fl be a i to other their original position ready for the treatment treatment such f of another bottle. The operation is simple and According thls Invention the bottlesare bottles may be blown at the rate of ten to one blown with a jet of air with suflicient force to rehundred or more bottles per minute mo any splinters of glass or other fore j' The invention will be further described inconticles which the bottles may contain. The air ngctmnwith the accompanying drawings, but it $223? g g gz fifig f g i 3 12: is intended and is to be understood that it is not mg treatment desired before being used for hmlted f-' 5 blowing the bottles. Tests have shown that bot- In the drawmgsi tles cleaned i'n'this way are freer from germs, etc. F 1 h ws the blowing apparatus in perthan bottles which havebeen subjected to'the speetive; e i g ordinary wet cleaning treatment and they are Fig. 2 is a detail showing the cam movement also freer from foreign particles. They present for the operation of the ejector and air tube; 56

.Fig. 3 is a cross-section of the trough or bottle holder; and

Fig. 4 is a schematic plan view indicating how the bottles may travel in being removed from a container, blown and filled and then returned to a container.

The shelf I is an inclined shelf which feeds the bottles by gravity into the trough or bottle holder 2. While in this trough the bottles are blown with air and they are then ejected onto the belt 3 which conveys them from the blowing apparatus. Fig. 1 shows the bottles as being delivered from the belt 3 onto the belt 4 and the arrangements of the belts 3 and 4 are such that the bottle is stood upright on the conveyor 4 and it is thus delivered to the filling machine in an upright position. The guideboards 5 prevent the bottles from rolling off the conveyors 3 and 4.

As the bottle rolls into the bottle holder 2 the neck of the bottle fits into the ejector-head 6. The ejector-head is generally cylindrical but a portion on the side toward the shelf I is cut away as shown in detail in Figs. 2 and 3 so that the neck of the bottle rolls into the ejector-head and rests there while-the bottle is blown and also while the ejector removes the bottle from the apparatus.

Suilicient time elapses between the ejection of one.

bottle and the start of the blowing of the next bottle for this next bottle to be received in place with its neck in the bottle-holder.

The operation of the ejector and the air tube will best be understood by reference to Fig. 2. As soon as the bottle is in place the air tube I moves in through the neck into the bottle. There is an opening 8 in the butt end of the air tube. when the air tube is way in the bottle, 1. e. when it is at the forward end of its stroke or-in the in position, the opening 8 is brought into communication with the air supply line 8. Compressed air then passes through the line 9 and then by the opening 8 through the interior of the tube 1 into the bottle. The pressure of the air is sufficient to blow any foreign particles from the bottle.

After the bottle has been blown'a sufficient length of time the ejector-head is set in motion. It moves to the left and ejects the bottle from the bottle holder onto the conveyor 3. The ejectorhead 6 is fastened onto the ejector tube III and the lever arm II which actuates the air tube moves through the slot I2 in this ejector tube III. When the ejector tube is at the end of its forward stroke the end I3 of the slot I2 presses against the lever arm II and holds the air tube in the in position until the ejector arm again moves backward. As soon as the air tube reaches the forward end of its stroke, 1. e. as soon as it reaches the in position, the blowing .of the bottlecommences. After the blowing commences the ejector-head 6 begins its forward stroke. The bottle is blown continuously until the end of the forward stroke of the ejector-head 6, i. e. until the bottle has been ejected from the bottle holder. The airtube I and the ejector-head then move backward together, the backward movement of the lever arm II being controlled by the movement of the ejector tube through the pressure of the lever arm II against the end I3 of the slot I2.

The movements of the air tube and the ejector tube are controlled from the cam shaft I4 through the cams I5 and IS. The cam shaft I4 is driven by the pulley I I through the pulleys I8 and I9. When the cams are in the position shown in Fig. 2 the air tube 1 has just reached the in position and the ejector tube has not yet commenced its forward stroke. The operation of the air tube is controlled by the action of the cam I B on the stud 20 which is fastened to the lever 2I. The spring 22 tends to hold the lever 2| and thus the air tube in the out position and it returns the air tube to the out position when the ejector tube is at the end of its backward stroke. The position of the ejector tube is controlled by the cam it which operates on the stud 23 which is attached to the lever 24. The spring 25 tends to hold the ejector tube at the end of its backward stroke.

After a bottle has been received in the bottleholder or trough 2 the air tube is moved into the in position as shown in Fig. 2 by the pressure of the cam IS on the stud 20. This brings the opening 8 into communication with the air supply pipe 9 and the bottle-is blown. As the cam shaft I4 rotates the cam I 6 moves the ejector tube into the forward position and the bottle is ejected from the holder. At the end of the forward stroke the end I3 of the slot I2 in the ejector tube III presses against the lever arm I I and holds the air tube in the in position while the cam I5 moves out of contact with the stud 20. Then as the cam shaft continues to rotate and the cm I! completes its cycle, the ejector tube is returned to its original position by the spring 25 and the air tube is returned to the out position by the spring 22. The bottle is thus blown and then ejected from the bottle holder 2 onto the conveyor 3. The drawings show a belt 25 for driving the pulley 2| which drives the conveyor belt 3.

For the sake of simplicity Fig. 1 shows only a few bottles on the inclined shelf I. In actual practice the bottles on the shelf will roll to the bottom of the shelf so that the bottom of the shelf will always be full and the next bottle to be blown will always be in contact with the bottle which is in the bottle-holder and actually being blown. I

Fig. 4 shows in a diagrammatic way one method of handling bottles so that they are blown just prior to being filled. The bottles are filled into the container 30 from the leer at the bottle works. They are taken from this container and fed onto the conveyor or chute 3|. This delivers them onto the inclined shelf I. The stop-bar 32 lines the bottles up and they roll down the inclined shelf in regular order to the bottle-holder 2 where they are blown. Any foreign particles in the bottles are removed during the blowing operation. They are delivered from the bottle-holder 2 by the ejector onto the conveyor 3. From this conveyor they are stood upright on the conveyor 4. The conveyor 4 delivers them to the filling, stoppering and labeling machine or machines 32. This machine or machines in turn delivers them onto theconveyor 34 from which they are replaced by hand or machine into the original or another carton or container 35. Labelling, numbering and other operations may be interposed between the blowing operation and the filling operation or between the filling operation and the packaging operation in which the bottles are returned to a container, or the bottles may be subjected to other processing steps as desired, but it is understood that the bottle is subjected to the blowing step just prior to being filled, i. e. withoutappreciable delay during which the bottles might become contaminated with dust, etc. The bottles may pass directly from the blowing machine to the filling machine or they may be labelled or otherwise treated between the blowing operation and the filling operation.

The invention provides a dry cleaning treatment during which the bottles are blown with air applied to the treatment of cylindrical bottles by a process in which the bottles are fed by gravity into the blowing apparatus and then ejected horizontally onto the conveyor by which they are removed from the blowing machine, it is understood that the invention is not limited thereto but with appropriate modifications the blowing treatment may be applied to bottles which are other than round and the bottles may be fed to or removed from the blowing apparatus by positive means or by gravity or in any other suitable manner, as desired.

I claim:

1. In a bottle-treating machine, an ejectorhead adapted to receive the mouth of a bottle, an air tube, an operating lever connected with the air tube and adapted to move it in and out of the bottle, an operating lever connected with the ejectorhead and adapted to move it in a horizontal position and to eject the bottle from the machine, a cam shaft, and cams on the shaft for actuating the operating levers.

2. In a bottle-treating machine, an ejectorhead adapted to receive a bottle, an operating lever adapted to move'the ejector-head so as to eject the bottle from the machine, an air tube, an operating lever adapted to move the tube in and out of the bottle, an air supply pipe adapted to supply air to the air tube when it is in the bottle, a cam shaft, a cam for actuating each of the operating levers, the two cams being so timed that the ejector ejects the bottle after it has been blown.

3. In a bottle-treating machine, a bottle-holder, a shelf for feeding bottles by gravity to the bottle-holder, an air tube connected with means for moving it in and out of a bottle in the bottleholder, an ejector head adapted to receive the mou th of a bottle when it is fed to the holder from the shelf, and means for moving the ejectorhead so as to eject bottles from the bottle-holder, the ejector head and the air tube both being reciprocally mounted in a horizontal position on concentric axes in a line parallel with the axis of the bottle-holder.

4. In a bottle-treating machine, a bottle-holder, a shelf for feeding bottles by gravity to the bottle-holder, an air tube adapted to be inserted in a bottle when it is in the bottle-holder, an ejector tube adapted to receive the neck or a bot tle when the bottle is in the bottle-holder, the bottle ejector and the air tube both being adapted to reciprocate in a horizontal position on concentric axes in a line parallel with the axis of the bottle-holder, and cam means for actuating both the air tube and the bottle ejector, the cams being so timed that the air tube is inserted in the bottle before the ejector moves the bottle out of the bottle-holder.

5. In a bottle-treating machine, a bottle-holder mounted on a'horizontal axis adapted to receive a bottle for blowing, a bottle-ejector adapted to press against the top of the bottle below the neck, cam-actuated means adapted to move the bottle ejector on an axis parallel to the axisof the bottle-holder so as to eject. the bottle from the bottle-holder, an air tube, cam-actuated means adapted to move the air tube on an axis concentric with the axis on which the bottle-ejector moves and to reciprocate the air tube through the ejector-head in and out of the bottle, and cam means so timed that the air tube moves forward into the bottle while the ejector-head is maintained at the end of its backward stroke.

6. In a bottle-treating machine, a bottle-holder, an air tube connected with means adapted to cause it to reciprocate in and out of a bottle in the bottle-holder and an ejector to remove a bottle from the bottle-holder, the air tube and ejector being reciprocally mounted on concentric axes.

"I. In a bottle-treating machine, an ejector head adapted to receive the mouth of a bottle, an air tube, means whereby air may be forced through said tube into the bottle only when the tube is in the bottle, an operating lever connected with the air'tube and adapted to move it into and out of the bottle, an operating lever connected with the ejector head and adapted to move it to eject the bottle from the machine, and means for operating said levers.

PAUL S. PI'I'IENGER. 

